 | |
| Author | Tom Bower |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Subject | Biography of Mohamed Al-Fayed |
| Genre | Nonfiction, biography |
| Publisher | Macmillan |
Publication date | October 1998 |
| Media type | Hardback |
| Pages | 496 |
| ISBN | 9780333745540 |
Fayed: The Unauthorized Biography is a 1998 biography by Tom Bower of the Egyptian businessman Mohamed Al-Fayed.
It was published in hardback by Macmillan in October 1998 with 496 pages. [1] The book sold well and had sold 15,000 copies and been reprinted by November 1998. [2]
Tom Bower is an investigative journalist and biographer. He had previously written biographies of the businessmen Robert Maxwell and Tiny Rowland. [3] The Egyptian businessman Mohamed Al-Fayed had had a long adversarial relationship with Rowland which stemmed from their falling out in the aftermath of Al-Fayed's acquisition of the House of Fraser retail group which included the London department store Harrods. [3] Bower had previously held the launch of the paperback edition of one of his two biographies of Maxwell at Harrods. [3] Al-Fayed had assisted Bower with material for his book on Rowland. [3] Michael Cole, Al-Fayed's spokesperson, said that "On the basis that my enemy's enemy is my friend, we gave [Bower] a great deal of useful assistance". [3] Cole subsequently described the claims in Bower's book as "a travesty of the truth" and that "We helped Tom, and then he betrayed all of that help ... I don't have any personal animus against him. But I don't trust him". [3] Bower was flown to Paris in Al-Fayed's helicopter to interview staff at the Ritz three days after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales in September 1997. [3] Bower subsequently declined an offer of £400,000 from Al-Fayed to write his biography. [4]
Bower met Adnan Khashoggi at the Connaught Hotel to help him with research for the book. Khashoggi told Bower that Al-Fayed was " ... an unbelievable criminal and liar" and said "Be careful. He's dangerous". [4] Bower was the subject of an entrapment attempt to get him to purchase "purportedly stolen photo albums in which Fayed had recorded his sexual conquests". The event bought their acquaintance to an end. [3]
The book was reviewed in The Evening Standard by Paul Foot. He praised it as "amazing" and felt that Al-Fayed's life bore comparison with Bower's previous subject, Robert Maxwell, as the "similarities between the two tyrants emerge from every page" but that Al-Fayed "outshone" Maxwell in his hypocrisy and "both used their enormous wealth and power to terrify their employees". [5]
Martin Vander Weyer reviewed Fayed in the Daily Telegraph and wrote that Al-Fayed "seems to have met his match in Tom Bower" and that "despite some mildly irritating stylistic tics, [Bower] is the Inspector Morse of investigative biographers, a fluent phlegmatic story-teller and a master of intricacies". [1] Vander Weyer felt that Bower created a "richly comic portrait" of a "kind of crazed" Egyptian version of Ronnie Barker's shopkeeper character Albert Arkwright, in Open All Hours . [1]
In a 2007 profile of Bower for The Guardian , Oliver Burkeman described the book as " ... that rare thing - a book by turns so entertaining and alarming that even reading the index is an engrossing experience". [3]
In his review for The Guardian , A. N. Wilson wrote that "In the early pages of the story the reader is constantly impressed by how much odder, and in a way more impressive, the reality of Fayed's life has been than the crudely fantastic lies he spins about it" and that the book " ... fills you with utter contempt, not just for Fayed but for England and all the greedy, unprincipled men whom we ask to be our City bankers, our newspaper proprietors, our MPs". [6]
Jonathan Calvert reviewed the book in The Observer and felt the prior publication of the profile of Al-Fayed by Maureen Orth in Vanity Fair magazine meant that Bower's fresh revelations lacked the impact they would otherwise have had and that there was "nothing new of substance to merit the publisher's claim that this is the 'most controversial book of the year'". Calvert wrote that it would have been interesting to read a psychological analysis that sought to explain what creates men like Al-Fayed. [7]
Mohamed Al-Fayed was a British-based Egyptian businessman, whose residence and primary business interests were in the United Kingdom from the mid-1960s. His business interests included ownership of the Hôtel Ritz Paris, and Harrods department store and Fulham Football Club, both in London. At the time of his death in 2023, Fayed's wealth was estimated at US$2 billion by Forbes.
Emad El-Din Mohamed Abdel Mena'em Fayed, commonly known as Dodi Fayed, was an Egyptian film producer and the eldest child of the businessman Mohamed Al-Fayed. He was romantically involved with Diana, Princess of Wales, when they both died in a car crash in Paris on 31 August 1997.
Harrods is a British luxury department store located on Brompton Road in Knightsbridge, London, England. It is owned by Harrods Ltd, a company currently owned by the state of Qatar via its sovereign wealth fund, the Qatar Investment Authority. The Harrods brand also applies to other enterprises undertaken by the Harrods group of companies, including Harrods Estates, Harrods Aviation and Air Harrods. Recognised as one of the world's leading department stores, it is visited by 15 million people per year.
The "cash-for-questions affair" was a political scandal of the 1990s in the United Kingdom.
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Adnan Khashoggi was a Saudi businessman and arms dealer known for his lavish business deals and lifestyle. He was estimated to have had a peak net worth of around US$4 billion in the early 1980s.
Roland Walter "Tiny" Rowland was a British businessman, corporate raider and the chief executive of the Lonrho conglomerate from 1962 to 1993. He gained fame from a number of high-profile takeover bids, in particular his attempt to take control of Harrods. He was known for his complex business interests in Africa and his closeness to a number of African leaders.
Thomas Michael Bower is a British writer and former BBC journalist and television producer. He is known for his investigative journalism and for his unauthorised biographies, often of business tycoons and newspaper proprietors.
Heini Wathén-Fayed is a Finnish socialite and former model. She is the widow of Egyptian businessman Mohamed Al-Fayed. She was an officer for The Ritz Hotel, London.
Samira Khashoggi was a Saudi Arabian progressive author, as well as the founder of Al Sharkiah magazine. She was the sister of the Saudi businessman Adnan Khashoggi. She was the first wife of Egyptian businessman Mohamed Al-Fayed and the mother of filmmaker Dodi Al-Fayed. She died of a heart attack in 1986 at the age of 51.
Harrods Buenos Aires was an Argentine retail company based in Buenos Aires, whose building was located on the corner of Córdoba Avenue and San Martin street. The store was a branch of the famous Harrods of London which was opened in 1849. Harrods Buenos Aires opened in 1914 and closed in 1998, since closure there has been numerous attempts to reopen the store.
4 route du Champ d'Entraînement, also known as Villa Windsor, is a historic villa in the 16th arrondissement of Paris, within the northwest section of the Bois de Boulogne, close to the southern edge of Neuilly-sur-Seine. The house from 1929 is owned by the City of Paris and leased to the family of Mohamed Al-Fayed. From 1952 until 1986, it was the Paris home of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor.
Allied Stars Ltd was a film production company created by Egyptian businessman Mohamed Al-Fayed in 1979. The firm was dissolved on March 3, 2020.
A plaster and resin sculpture of Michael Jackson stood outside Craven Cottage in Fulham, London, the ground of Fulham Football Club, from 2011 until 2013. Commissioned by the club's chairman Mohamed Al-Fayed, it was removed by his successor Shahid Khan. From 2014 to 2019 the statue was on display at the National Football Museum in Manchester.
Conrad and Lady Black: Dancing on the Edge is a 2006 biography of the Canadian businessman and author Conrad Black and his wife, the British born Canadian journalist Barbara Amiel, by the British journalist and biographer Tom Bower.
Muhammad Khaled Khashoggi (1889–1978), also spelled as Mohamed Khaled Khashoggi, was a Saudi medical doctor. He was King Abdulaziz Al Saud's personal physician.
Michael Cole is a former BBC television journalist and royal correspondent. After leaving the BBC, he worked as director of public affairs for Harrods, and thus also as a spokesman for its owner Mohamed Al Fayed.
Innocent Victims is a copper statue of Diana, Princess of Wales, and Dodi Fayed, which was on display at the Harrods department store in London, England, between 2005 and 2018. It was commissioned by Dodi's father Mohamed Al-Fayed when he owned Harrods, and designed by William Mitchell.
Omar Fayed is a British-born Finnish-Egyptian environmentalist and publisher. He is CEO of ESTEE, based in Switzerland and Britain, that advocates human space exploration, space colonization, and sustainable human development within the biosphere. He is co-founder and CEO of EarthX, a data visualization and mapping company based on NASA’s World Wind Project. He is chairman of Synergetic Press based in New Mexico, and a fellow of the Institute of Ecotechnics.
The fifth season of The Crown, which follows the life and reign of Queen Elizabeth II, was released by Netflix on 9 November 2022. It was the first season of the series to be released following both the death of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh on 9 April 2021 and the death of Queen Elizabeth II on 8 September 2022; filming took place between the former and the latter's death.